Don't expect to see flying pigs or dancing chickens when you stop at Spacehogs BBQ on Battlefield Parkway, just count on finding some of the area's most succulent smoked meats and homemade sides.
Wayne Palmer fires up the grill at Spacehogs BBQ on Battlefield Parkway."Our food has been described as 'out of this world,'" owner and cook extraordinaire Wayne Palmer said. "I love to eat, I love to cook, but mostly it makes me feel good to see people enjoy my food."
A 1988 graduate of Lakeview-Fort Oglethorpe High School, Palmer opened the eatery just to the west of his alma mater in September.
"My dream has always been to have a restaurant," he said. "I thought it would be something I did after retiring, but this opportunity came along and I thought, 'If not now, when?'"
Honing his skill at the grill - "I've probably wasted thousands of dollars of meat learning to cook a brisket" - and developing recipes has been a 20-year quest that is still ongoing.
"My son Chaz and I come up with rubs for the meat by trial and error," Palmer said. "I'm constantly adding to the menu, but until I think our food is better than anyone else's, none of it never crosses the counter."
Customers can choose from concoctions based on barbecued pork or chicken, hamburgers and sandwiches.
"I make an Italian roast beef sandwich that draws raves from natives of Chicago, and customers tell me our Philly steak subs are better than Gino's - that they need to be renamed Fort O steak subs," Palmer said.
In addition to handcrafted meat dishes, everything on the menu, save for the Angus beef hot dogs, is made from scratch.
That includes chicken salad made from boneless breasts smoked on the grill, cooked-to-order french fries, homemade slaw and potato salad as well as a Southern specialty, fried okra.
"My goal is to offer a quality meal at a fair price in a pleasant atmosphere," Palmer said.
It is evident, whether in the kitchen, dining room or at the smoker grill, that he, his wife Kim, son Chaz Hanson and Jill-of-all-trades Kelley Lively take pride in their work.
Palmer describes his grill as "the Cadillac of smokers," understandable since he spent 17 years with a Ford dealership's service department and another five years as parts manager at BMW of Chattanooga; and it, combined with his special seasonings, is what makes Spacehogs unique.
"We handcraft all our rubs and spice mixes," he said. "Then we smoke them over a hickory and pecan wood fire. You will never go anywhere else and find anything that tastes like ours."
The piquant smoke that spirals from the big red smoker is an aromatic advertisement for aficionados of barbecue, but word of the menu's "death wings, extremely hot!" attracts those hankering for heat.
"I can only eat three [wings]," Palmer said. "One person has eaten 10 - it took him about 45 minutes."
The food may be "out-of-this-world" good, but its presentation is equally important to Palmer and company.
"We want this to be a place you feel at home. Nothing ever sits under a heat lamp to keep warm; everything is 100 percent real," Palmer said. "I want it to feel like when you went to your grandma's as a kid. You knew the food would be good and that you'd enjoy eating it."
And like those meals at grandma's, the portions at Spacehogs are substantial.
"We go through a lot of to-go boxes," Palmer said. "People don't leave here hungry."